Page All:
Page 1
Wholesale Applications Community Accelerates Delivery of Open Applications Platform
LONDON, July 27, 2010--
- WAC Announces Company Formation, Leadership, Board and Business Models;
- Agrees to Join Forces with Joint Innovation Lab (JIL)
The Wholesale Applications Community (WAC), an alliance of
telecommunications companies committed to building an open applications
platform, today announced its formation as a corporate entity, as well as the
organisation's leadership and board of directors. The company also announced
that it will join forces with the Joint Innovation Lab (JIL), accelerating
the commercial launch of WAC-enabled application stores. The transaction is
expected to be completed in September 2010. Finally, WAC outlined the
business models and technology evolution path that will enable developers,
operators and other commercial organisations to monetise applications and
services.
Peters Suh has been named the CEO of the Wholesale Applications
Community. Most recently Peters was the CEO of the Joint Innovation Lab
(JIL), a joint venture between China Mobile, SOFTBANK MOBILE, Verizon
Wireless, and Vodafone. Prior to JIL, Peters held a number of executive
positions at Vodafone, Fremont Communications and AirTouch.
"Today the Wholesale Applications Community comes into being as an
established company, and this is a hugely exciting time for everyone involved
in the organisation," commented Suh. "Our goal is to create a wholesale
applications ecosystem that will establish a simple route to market for
developers to deliver the latest innovative applications and services to the
widest possible base of customers around the world. We're focused on
establishing WAC as the first choice for brands and developers in the mobile
ecosystem, ultimately delivering greater choice and value for the end user,
the consumer."
The company announced that Michel Combes, Vodafone Chief Executive Europe
has been elected Chairman of the Wholesale Applications Community, and
Jean-Philippe Vanot, Deputy CEO, France Telecom has been named as Vice
Chairman.
In addition to Combes and Vanot, the WAC board of directors includes:
- John Donovan, CTO, AT&T
- Li Zhengmao, VP, China Mobile
- Olivier Baujard, CTO Deutsche Telekom
- Alex Sinclair, Chief Strategy and Technology Officer, GSMA
- Dr Hyun-Myung PYO, President of Mobile Business Group, KT Corporation
- Dr Kiyohito Nagata, SVP, NTT DOCOMO
- Sung Min Ha, President Mobile Network Operation Business Unit, SK
Telecom
- Napoleon Nazareno, President and CEO, Smart Communications
- Tetsuzo Matsumoto, Senior Executive Vice President, SOFTBANK MOBILE
Corp.
- Marco Patuano, Head of Domestic Market Operations, Telecom Italia
- Vivek Dev, Group Director of Global New Services, Telefonica
- Dr. Hannes Ametsreiter, CEO, Telekom Austria Group
- Morten-Karlsen Sorby, EVP and Head of Corporate Development, Telenor
- Dick Lynch, EVP and CTO, Verizon
Business Models to Enable Monetisation Across the Ecosystem
At launch, WAC will allow operators to distribute applications through
their respective application storefronts and charge users through their
existing phone bill. In this model, developers will set the application price
and will receive a revenue share for the transaction. The revenue share will
be defined on an operator-by-operator basis. This will ensure that revenue
shares will be competitive in today's application market. WAC is a
not-for-profit organisation and will receive a small transaction fee for each
application to cover its operating costs.
In the future, WAC will offer business models that enable additional
purchases from within an application; leverage network capabilities, such as
location, to enhance an application; and facilitate the serving of
advertisements to end users.
"Developers will see great benefit in a single process through which they
can create, distribute and profit from their applications on multiple retail
outlets," said John Delaney, Research Director for Consumer Mobile with
industry analysts IDC. "Unification with JIL will prove a significant boost
for the Wholesale Application Community's efforts to achieve a global, open
development platform."
WAC Specification and SDK Available in November
WAC will publish its initial specification and components of its SDK to
developers in November. This specification will be based on W3C standards and
create a strong platform for developing rich mobile web applications. WAC
will also provide backwards compatibility for devices based upon the current
JIL and BONDI specifications. Details of the developer roadmap and a preview
of the WAC specifications will be available in September.
Developers currently creating JIL applications can continue working with
the existing JIL specification, tools and software libraries and these
applications can be deployed on JIL based devices immediately. With the
publication of the WAC specification, developers will also have a clear path
to deploy applications on a wider range of devices supporting the WAC
specification in 2011.
"Today's announcement that we are bringing together the innovation and
leadership of WAC and JIL to form a combined entity marks a great step
forward in our goal to provide a truly unified and open applications
environment," said Michel Combes, Chairman of the Wholesale Applications
Community. "I am honoured to have been elected chairman of WAC and look
forward to serving with our distinguished board and company leadership to
turn this vision into reality."
Editors notes:
Michel Combes, Vodafone Chief Executive Europe and Chairman of the
Wholesale Applications Community, and Jean-Philippe Vanot, Deputy CEO, France
Telecom and Vice Chairman of WAC will join WAC management on a webinar today
at 2pm UTC/ 3pm BST to discuss their commitment to the success of the WAC
initiative. For dial in and webinar details, please contact Phil Rawcliffe on
press@wholesaleappcommunity.com
About the Wholesale Applications Community
Launched in February 2010, the Wholesale Applications Community (WAC) is
an open global alliance formed from leading organisations within the telecoms
sector. Uniting a fragmented applications marketplace, WAC will create an
open industry platform that benefits the entire ecosystem, including
applications developers, handset manufacturers, OS owners, network operators
and end users.
The Wholesale Applications Community will:
- Accelerate and expand the market for applications - Simplify
application development by giving developers the opportunity to write
applications that can be deployed across multiple platforms and
multiple operators, and address a potential global market of more than
3 billion users.
- Create more compelling applications - Enable developers to utilise both
device and network capabilities to create the next generation of
applications.
- Provide greater choice for users - Enable portability of applications
across devices, operating systems and network operators.
For a list of members and more information, please go to
http://www.wholesaleappcommunity.com
Source: GSMA
Press Contact: Phil Rawcliffe, +44(0)7889-320159, press@wholesaleappcommunity.com;
Claire Cranton, +44(0)7885-839427, press@wholesaleappcommunity.com
Wholesale Applications Community Accelerates Delivery of Open Applications Platform
LONDON, July 27, 2010--
- WAC Announces Company Formation, Leadership, Board and Business Models;
- Agrees to Join Forces with Joint Innovation Lab (JIL)
The Wholesale Applications Community (WAC), an alliance of
telecommunications companies committed to building an open applications
platform, today announced its formation as a corporate entity, as well as the
organisation's leadership and board of directors. The company also announced
that it will join forces with the Joint Innovation Lab (JIL), accelerating
the commercial launch of WAC-enabled application stores. The transaction is
expected to be completed in September 2010. Finally, WAC outlined the
business models and technology evolution path that will enable developers,
operators and other commercial organisations to monetise applications and
services.
Peters Suh has been named the CEO of the Wholesale Applications
Community. Most recently Peters was the CEO of the Joint Innovation Lab
(JIL), a joint venture between China Mobile, SOFTBANK MOBILE, Verizon
Wireless, and Vodafone. Prior to JIL, Peters held a number of executive
positions at Vodafone, Fremont Communications and AirTouch.
"Today the Wholesale Applications Community comes into being as an
established company, and this is a hugely exciting time for everyone involved
in the organisation," commented Suh. "Our goal is to create a wholesale
applications ecosystem that will establish a simple route to market for
developers to deliver the latest innovative applications and services to the
widest possible base of customers around the world. We're focused on
establishing WAC as the first choice for brands and developers in the mobile
ecosystem, ultimately delivering greater choice and value for the end user,
the consumer."
The company announced that Michel Combes, Vodafone Chief Executive Europe
has been elected Chairman of the Wholesale Applications Community, and
Jean-Philippe Vanot, Deputy CEO, France Telecom has been named as Vice
Chairman.
In addition to Combes and Vanot, the WAC board of directors includes:
- John Donovan, CTO, AT&T
- Li Zhengmao, VP, China Mobile
- Olivier Baujard, CTO Deutsche Telekom
- Alex Sinclair, Chief Strategy and Technology Officer, GSMA
- Dr Hyun-Myung PYO, President of Mobile Business Group, KT Corporation
- Dr Kiyohito Nagata, SVP, NTT DOCOMO
- Sung Min Ha, President Mobile Network Operation Business Unit, SK
Telecom
- Napoleon Nazareno, President and CEO, Smart Communications
- Tetsuzo Matsumoto, Senior Executive Vice President, SOFTBANK MOBILE
Corp.
- Marco Patuano, Head of Domestic Market Operations, Telecom Italia
- Vivek Dev, Group Director of Global New Services, Telefonica
- Dr. Hannes Ametsreiter, CEO, Telekom Austria Group
- Morten-Karlsen Sorby, EVP and Head of Corporate Development, Telenor
- Dick Lynch, EVP and CTO, Verizon
Business Models to Enable Monetisation Across the Ecosystem
At launch, WAC will allow operators to distribute applications through
their respective application storefronts and charge users through their
existing phone bill. In this model, developers will set the application price
and will receive a revenue share for the transaction. The revenue share will
be defined on an operator-by-operator basis. This will ensure that revenue
shares will be competitive in today's application market. WAC is a
not-for-profit organisation and will receive a small transaction fee for each
application to cover its operating costs.
In the future, WAC will offer business models that enable additional
purchases from within an application; leverage network capabilities, such as
location, to enhance an application; and facilitate the serving of
advertisements to end users.
"Developers will see great benefit in a single process through which they
can create, distribute and profit from their applications on multiple retail
outlets," said John Delaney, Research Director for Consumer Mobile with
industry analysts IDC. "Unification with JIL will prove a significant boost
for the Wholesale Application Community's efforts to achieve a global, open
development platform."
WAC Specification and SDK Available in November
WAC will publish its initial specification and components of its SDK to
developers in November. This specification will be based on W3C standards and
create a strong platform for developing rich mobile web applications. WAC
will also provide backwards compatibility for devices based upon the current
JIL and BONDI specifications. Details of the developer roadmap and a preview
of the WAC specifications will be available in September.
Developers currently creating JIL applications can continue working with
the existing JIL specification, tools and software libraries and these
applications can be deployed on JIL based devices immediately. With the
publication of the WAC specification, developers will also have a clear path
to deploy applications on a wider range of devices supporting the WAC
specification in 2011.
"Today's announcement that we are bringing together the innovation and
leadership of WAC and JIL to form a combined entity marks a great step
forward in our goal to provide a truly unified and open applications
environment," said Michel Combes, Chairman of the Wholesale Applications
Community. "I am honoured to have been elected chairman of WAC and look
forward to serving with our distinguished board and company leadership to
turn this vision into reality."
Editors notes:
Michel Combes, Vodafone Chief Executive Europe and Chairman of the
Wholesale Applications Community, and Jean-Philippe Vanot, Deputy CEO, France
Telecom and Vice Chairman of WAC will join WAC management on a webinar today
at 2pm UTC/ 3pm BST to discuss their commitment to the success of the WAC
initiative. For dial in and webinar details, please contact Phil Rawcliffe on
press@wholesaleappcommunity.com
About the Wholesale Applications Community
Launched in February 2010, the Wholesale Applications Community (WAC) is
an open global alliance formed from leading organisations within the telecoms
sector. Uniting a fragmented applications marketplace, WAC will create an
open industry platform that benefits the entire ecosystem, including
applications developers, handset manufacturers, OS owners, network operators
and end users.
The Wholesale Applications Community will:
- Accelerate and expand the market for applications - Simplify
application development by giving developers the opportunity to write
applications that can be deployed across multiple platforms and
multiple operators, and address a potential global market of more than
3 billion users.
- Create more compelling applications - Enable developers to utilise both
device and network capabilities to create the next generation of
applications.
- Provide greater choice for users - Enable portability of applications
across devices, operating systems and network operators.
For a list of members and more information, please go to
http://www.wholesaleappcommunity.com
Source: GSMA
Press Contact: Phil Rawcliffe, +44(0)7889-320159, press@wholesaleappcommunity.com;
Claire Cranton, +44(0)7885-839427, press@wholesaleappcommunity.com